DMAIC & Quality Problem Solving Case Study $23-24$

It$$s October $2024.$ You had been working there for just three weeks when the Senior Engineer, Eamon called you aside one day at midday. $$I have a very big favour to request from you. I know you$$re only here three months and this is $$dropping you in at the deep end$$ but I have little choice. $$James was scheduled to give the downtime improvement

presentation to Mike$.$ James was Eamon$$s and your supervisor.

$$As you know, James went on unpaid leave $3$ days ago and is at home with his young family. His partner Petra is still in intensive care in the hospital after an unfortunate serious accident two weeks ago. She was

not at fault so was very unlucky. I know she$$s a battler but it seems it will be a few weeks yet before she$$s

out of hospital and back at work. I$$d normally provide backup to James and given what$$s happened, I$$d

want to help him in any way I could. However, I$$ve now just been asked to go to our UK factory for a week to sort out a critical palletizer problem there. As I$$m the only one with the requisite technical

knowledge in the company right now, Mike has told me I had to go over to the UK for a week$.$Who$$s Mike, Eamonn?$$ you asked. $$O did nobody tell you that, already?$$ says Eamon laughing. $$Mike is the $$big boss$$ around here$----$Mike Odassi is his name. He is our managing director. We$$re all answerable

to him around here, you know. As I$$m going to be away, Mike asked me to delegate the presentation on the downtime solutions to another technical person. Mike wants the presentation done in the next few days days as these issues are a big priority for him$.$Let$$s see how good are those TU Dublin Bolton Street Masters graduates you recently hired$$ he said to me yesterday. $$Maybe they can do it$.$ I don$$t know. Are the new hires good enough? You did tell me they were experienced and keen. It$$s up to you, Eamonn but I$$d like to see whether they can show us the way. Can they show us what we need to do$?$ Above all, I need an appropriate action plan to fix these problems. I

don$$t want $20$ answers. I want a justified action plan with clearly defined actions for named people and an estimation of the expected tangible benefits from the proposed actions. Five or six justified proposed actions is sufficient provided they are the correct answers which really address the underlying causes of our

problems and will give us the benefits this company needs$$Well I think you$$re good enough and so I$$m asking you to do it with your other colleagues.$$ said Eamon

to you. $$OK$.$ We$$ll give it a try$$ you say apprehensively. $$Tell me more about it though$$ you say. $$What does he want?$$ He wants a well$-$argued plan to significantly reduce the ongoing downtime on the XLR DVD packaging machines. He says the downtime is too much. We have lots of packaging orders and even more next quarter. We have to reduce downtime if we$$re to get them all packed out in time. He says he wants to

move to a lean manufacturing model. He has already been driving $5$S housekeeping quite hard but it is very difficult to make product flow if we have instability in relation of downtime performance. He knows that

we may have set$-$up issues too $($when moving between job types$)$ but he wants to tackle downtime before moving on to tackling other issues Last week, he said to me: $$I like $$managing by walking around$$ and typically I go to that XLR area randomly about once a day during its four$-$day running period. On average, it is down close to $20\%$ of the

times I look. It seems to be a different thing every day. What should we do to reduce this? Downtime must

be running about $20\%.$ We can$$t afford $20\%.$ We$$ve got to cut it to $5$ or $6\%$ next quarter and maintain stability on same. Do maintenance know what the solutions are? What are the critical issues? If someone

could tell me the top five or six things we could reasonably do to fix it and convince me these were the right things to ensure we reach our goal, I$$d be happy to support making them happen. But extra shifts or

additional production hours or additional ongoing maintenance overtime is not the answer. We have to get

more out within the time we already have available by identifying and addressing the root cause of our issues. I won$$t add ongoing production overtime or extra production shifts. That will cost us even more. It$$s very competitive out there in the marketplace. I didn$$t make up the market rules myself but I$$m certain this company, if it is to remain successful, will have to live by the rules of competition.

The prices in our market are falling and we have to be lean to win orders at the current market prices. If we

don$$t improve our uptime, we$$ll continue to miss our production targets or meet them sporadically. Our

profits will fall this quarter. I don$$t want to be reducing the number of Engineers and technicians in the

company next Spring because our profits have fallen. This is important for all of us$,$ Eamonn$.$Do you think it would